Mother's Act Of Kindness Ends With Son Being Slain

Freed Inmate Charged With Killing Deliverer Of Bail Money

Quentin Maddox, serving a year in the County Detention Center on drug charges, called his mother on the phone Tuesday and begged her to bail out a man he had met only a few weeks before.

The mother gave in, used a credit card to post the $1,000 bond and her 19-year-old son went to the prison to give the man a ride to Pasadena.

The son, Marcus Maddox, never returned. He was found shot to death Wednesday evening in Quentin Maddox's Churchton home, a victim of what police describe as a bizarre slaying with plenty of twists -- butno motive.

The man Quentin Maddox apparently befriended, MacArthur Rayman, 18, of the 1200 block of Waugh Chapel Road in Gambrills, has been charged with first-degree murder.

Quentin's brother Marcus,who lived with his parents in the 1100 block of Bayview Vista Drive in Cape St. Claire, had been shot three times with a .22-caliber rifle -- once in the chest and twice in the head.

"I don't know what happened," said Marcus' father, Billy, a retired sergeant major with the U.S. Army. "All I know is that Marcus didn't come home. . . . My son begged my wife to bail MacArthur out. I wouldn't have done it."

Marcus Maddox had graduated from Broadneck High School in 1989 and hadplanned to become an architect. "He drew pictures and cartoons and portraits," said his father.

Sgt. William King, homicide unit commander, said police have not yet been able to fully question Rayman about the killing. "We don't know if they were clowning around or if there was an argument," he said.

Rayman was arrested on an outstanding warrant charging him with arson eight hours before the victim's body was found. He was picked up on the arson charge when he went to the State Police barracks in Glen Burnie to retrieve clothes taken before he was jailed.

But the scenario began Wednesday morning, when, Maddox's father said, his son went to the Detention Center at 1 to pick up Rayman. The victim was supposed to drive the man to his aunt's house in Pasadena to get reimbursed for the bail money.

But they apparently ended up at Quentin Maddox's house in the 1000 block of Rodgers Road in Churchton, probably to clean up and feed the dog, the father said.

Police say Marcus Maddox was shot sometime between 7:30a.m., when another brother spoke to him on the phone, and 10 a.m., when Rayman was arrested on the arson charge.

Officer V. Richard Molloy, county police spokesman, said Maddox's body was dumped in a hall closet. Police said Rayman then took Maddox's 1989 Dodge Daytona and left the car off Magothy Beach Road in Pasadena.

Molloy said Rayman then went to the State Police barracks in Glen Burnie and was sitting on the front steps with another man, Michael Wayne Lowe Jr., 18,of Pasadena, when Lt. Scott Sudduth, an arson investigator, walked by.

Sudduth had arrest warrants for Lowe and Rayman stemming from aMay 28 arson fire at a home in the 400 block of Riverside Drive. Sudduth had just learned of Rayman's release on bail and wanted to get aphotograph of him so he could serve the warrant.

Sudduth said thePasadena home sustained $170,000 in damage during the two-alarm blaze, started during one of three burglary attempts on residences with which Lowe and Rayman have been charged. Lowe and Rayman were taken tothe Western District police station and charged with arson.

Meanwhile, Marcus Maddox's brother, Andreas, had been trying all day to reach Marcus. He drove to Churchton and found the body at 6:23 p.m. Molloy said the police investigation led to Rayman, who brought authorities to the car and the rifle. Police then charged Rayman with first-degree murder.

Jim O'Neill, deputy superintendent of the County Detention Center, said Rayman had been held on breaking and entering charges since May 31. He shared a cell with 14 other inmates, including Quentin Maddox, who is serving a one-year sentence for selling marijuana.

Quentin Maddox was arrested in August 1990 after police saw him pass a marijuana cigarette to another man behind the Network Bar on Fort Smallwood Road. He had been arrested on drug charges in 1988 following a traffic stop on Route 173 and again in February 1990 aftermarijuana was found in his parents' home.

In a letter written just before Quentin Maddox was sentenced to jail, his father begged the judge not to send put him behind bars, saying the family planned to move.

"If you will grant this request and allow him to depart with his family, the State of Maryland and Anne Arundel County will be ridof him permanently," Billy Maddox wrote.

Rayman's prior criminal record includes an arrest in December, 1990, when he was charged withbreaking into his mother's Pasadena home and stealing about $300 shehad stored in Christmas cards.

Police said Rayman could be in District Court today for a bail review.